Kindness, The Universal
Language
Deirdre Davison, SPHR
The air has been crisp for the past week.
Crisp enough to see the season’s change dance off your breath. It’s
also the time of year when kids arrive home with handprint turkeys destined
for refrigerator doors and when school plays depict the first Thanksgiving
and the life of the Pilgrims.
Those early settlers were called pilgrims
not only because of their religious conviction, but also because they undertook
a journey, or pilgrimage. The word pilgrim is derived from the Latin,
peregrinus, which means foreigner. Today, each of us is a pilgrim
because we all experience a pilgrimage – the journey of life on Earth.
Throughout the course of this journey, there are times we feel like foreigners,
or feel out of sync – in relationships, in work, in thought, and in action.
Feeling like a foreigner in a relationship
can happen when there is a breakdown in communication. For example,
one client was having difficulty in her relationship with her husband.
She felt as though they weren’t on the same wave length anymore.
Because dialogue wasn’t flowing as easily as it once had, they began to
communicate differently. Actually, they began to communicate less.
As they interacted less and less, she began to perceive a distance between
them. While she loved her husband, she became unsure, lost confidence,
and as a result, retreated more emotionally.
What came to light through our conversations
was that her husband had recently taken a new job and was feeling an overwhelming
pressure to perform well. He worked longer hours than he was accustomed
to and came home exhausted every night. It wasn’t that he didn’t
care; he was just physically and mentally drained by the end of the day.
Through a number of measured steps, the couple intentionally began to engage
again. The wife stepped out of her comfort zone, took a chance, and
gave her husband a safe forum in which he could share his workday frustrations.
She started to encourage him again and in turn, he began to seek her out.
The long process of relearning each other’s language (love and kindness)
had begun and over the course of time, they rekindled the emotional intimacy
that had been misplaced.
It is just as easy to feel like a stranger
in a strange land at work as it is in relationships. The rules constantly
change. Team dynamics and personalities are always present and often
interfere with the goal – getting the job done. If you have
ever worked then you have experienced the discomfort of conflict, whether
it was interpersonal or organizational.
A former client found that she was experiencing
difficulty with a coworker. The coworker was a top producer and a
prima donna, at least in my client’s opinion. The woman was combative
and aggressive when anyone on the team challenged her in any way.
The supervisor remained hands off, so my client felt that her only choices
were to deal with the coworker, to ignore her, or to change jobs.
She wasn’t ready to change jobs and ignoring the ravings of her coworker
wasn’t an option either.
Initially, she thought that she should
deal with her coworker, but upon reflection chose to deal with herself
instead.
My client focused on her own motivations,
reactions, and subsequent behaviors. When there was an outburst in
the office and she felt angst, she practiced breathing exercises and answered
the following questions: “What has caused this tension within me? Is this
reaction appropriate and is it something that I can or should change? If
so, how can I do it and create an outcome that is positive for me and for
anyone else involved?”
My client learned to listen to her internal
leadership language and while her language was silent, others in the office
still felt and learned her language (grace and kindness) through her actions
as opposed to learning it from her reactions. Over time, she became
the group’s referent leader and was eventually promoted into a leadership
role.
Everyday you set the tone for your day
by the words you speak – to yourself, to loved ones, to friends and coworkers.
When you choose to use negative speak, you create a negative mood that
can last a day or much longer! When you choose to build up yourself
and those around you with encouraging words, you have taken the opportunity
to create a positive foundation. Keep in mind that you can’t control
the actions of others. You can only control how you choose to feel,
act, and communicate. The language of kindness and compassion is
a universal language that will keep you connected as you take your pilgrimage
through life and will ensure that you don’t feel like a foreigner in relationships,
work, thought, or action.
Deirdre Davison, President of Metanoia
Consortium, is a Professional Coach and Consultant and author of the Quickstart
Guide for Self-Employment and The Itty Bitty Vision Book. She can be reached
at 803-802-7773 or ddavison@metanoiaconsortium.com
